Course Descriptions
Case Management for Human Services
SOC 6323
Law and Practice in Human Services
3 credits
This course examines how the law impacts the delivery of human services in both direct ways through the civil and criminal court system and indirectly through the laws and regulations that define the rules, responsibilities, and entitlements of clients receiving support services. Topics will include child welfare, guardianships, involuntary commitments, competence, and civil rights. Special attention will also be given to the varying ethical duties and professional values within the human services and legal professions.SOC 6600
Social Inequality, Social Change, and Community Building
3 credits
Social stratification is the separation of groups and affects various categories including, but not limited to; race, ethnicity, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, religion, and socioeconomic status. When looking to build and strengthen communities, those working in the helping professions must first look around to see what systemic inequalities and injustices are occurring in the community and society as a whole. By examining inequality in these categories helping professionals can look further into changing policies, laws, and social climate on an individual and systemic level as well as influencing the health, well-being, and functioning of individuals and groups in society.SOC 6601
Case Management Interventions and Strategies
3 credits
Professionals working in community service fields are often called upon to carry case loads and utilize collaborative skills with other agencies in the community to help clients establish self-empowerment. Case Management is a comprehensive job that includes understanding client vulnerabilities and societal attitudes, interviewing and assessment skills as well as having connections to other agencies in the community that can help the client reach their goals. This course will give students the information they need to perform these tasks including; understanding vulnerable client population, interviewing skills, performing intake assessments and bio psychosocial assessments, documentation and note taking, establishing goals and identifying community resources to create treatment plans.SOC 6604
Case Management: Advocacy Skills & Client Services
3 credits
Learning to speak and act on behalf of oneself or advancing the interests of one client is a critical tool for human services practitioners. This course will focus on both formal and informal advocacy skills. The end result if to develop skills that are empowering and lead to effective change and greater well-being.SOC 6605
Ethical Practice in Case Management
3 credits
This course will focus on understanding ethical boundaries and consideration in helping relationships. As human services professionals, practitioners need to respect the dignity and welfare of all people, honor cultural diversity, and promote social justice while acting with integrity and staying within professional ethical boundaries.SOC 6606
21st Century Globalization
3 credits
21st century globalization will explore the diversity of the world’s developed and developing nations. During this course, students will review the gap that exists between nations with a special emphasis on cultural aspects of communications, values, social welfare, gender status, and the influence of social and public policies, trade, and technology. In addition, students will also examine the role of conflict and migration, and, the challenges they pose, in the global context.
SOC 6607
Culture & Communication
3 credits
Culture shapes communication. Understanding how the cultural context influences and affects communication across different cultures can help bridge international, and intercultural, misunderstandings. Learning self-awareness, and identifying individual ethnocentric perspectives will foster the ability to communicate our own ideas to those of another culture. This course will orient students to high context and low context cultures, sources of power distance, collectivistic and individualistic cultures, high and low context cultures, and review cultural dimensions related to workplace settings as well as those more relevant to interpersonal interactions.
SOC 6610
Human Services Helping Skills
3 credits
The Helping Profession is a broad term for a profession that can take individuals on many different career paths. Regardless of the path, you might choose, most have selected this field because they want to help people. The word help is also very broad, but in this class, we will hone in on how to define what help actually means and how we can create and build specific skills to be successful in work with others, regardless if that work is with individuals, groups, families, or organizations.
SOC 6620
Human Behavior & Human Systems
0 credits
Human services professionals work with people from all backgrounds, ages, ethnic and socio-economic groups, experiencing a wide variety of problems. They need to be grounded in understanding human development and human behavior, and know how the social environment influences both. As a foundation course working in the human services, this course will explore major theories of human development, compare physiological, neurological, psychological, emotional, spiritual, and social stages of human development and how they influence human behavior, apply micro, mezzo, and macro theories to explain, assess, and plan interventions with individuals, groups, organizations, and communities, and analyze cultural influences in human systems.SOC 7100
Ethical Financial Leadership in Human Services
3 credits
Students will evaluate and analyze the role of ethical financial leadership in Human Services organizations, including the effects on the organization and its stakeholders when ethical lapses in financial matters occur. Students will examine and reflect on classic and contemporary leadership theories, societal and personal values and ethics, multiculturalism in leadership, diversity, equity and inclusion, and leadership through conflict and change. Students will evaluate what it means to lead Human Services organizations ethically and compassionately while managing competing financial priorities in pursuit of the organization’s mission, vision, and values. Students will apply their learning to real-world contexts, preparing them to meet the challenges for which they will be responsible as ethical financial leaders in local, national, and global Human Services settings.